Her fascination with the world of fantasy began in her childhood, which was filled with reading, drawing and creating her own characters. Katarína’s creative impulses were supported at home which allowed her to fully immerse herself in the study of fine art techniques. Although she studied graphic design, her illustrative approach to this field resulted in a return to stories, fantasy, and books. She likes imaginative texts, but what pleases her most is if the story is happy and has a point. As she says, she doesn’t reject anything and she likes to challenge herself. The classical techniques such as painting in tempera, acrylic and the use of color pencils, which continues to employ, lend a gentleness and childlike playfulness to her work. Her illustrations full of pastel colors can be found in approximately forty books and textbooks. One of them is the two-sided fairy tale book O zlatej rybke / O rybke Beličke (About the Golden Fish / About the Little Common Bleak), which is part of her current exhibition. This book for children from the age of three combines two fairy tales from the water world. The classical story about a magic fish that can make the wishes of people come true and about what can happen when a man is conceited and greedy, is complemented by a fairy tale written by famous actor Jozef Kroner that teaches children the importance of friendship, courage and especially vigilance and knowledge, and that it pays off to listen to their elders. These tales are enriched by the amazing colorfulness of Katarína’s full page illustrations, which make the characters come to life and pull the reader directly into the story and the world of fantasy. In addition to drawing natural motifs and characters, she would like to illustrate themes from the culinary environment and publish her own picture book.
Katarína Gregušová
Katarína Ilkovičová (1982), a native of Prešov, studied graphic design at the Academy of Fine Arts in Krakow, Poland. After graduating, she worked as a graphic designer by day, while spending her evenings working on her own illustrations. Since 2007 she has illustrated dozens of books published in Slovakia and the Czech Republic, as well as Portugal, Italy and Taiwan. The very first book with her illustrations was Neplechy školníčky Agneše (The Hijinks of Agneša, the Janitor) written by Alžbeta Verešpejová who specifically asked for Katarína to be the illustrator. She won the awards Najkrajšia detská kniha zimy 2007 (The Most Beautiful Children’s Book of the Winter 2007) for Rozprávky z palety (Fairy Tales from the Palette) and Najkrajšia detská kniha jesene 2014 (The Most Beautiful Children’s Book of the Fall of 2014) for Snehuliačik šepol mame (The Little Snowman Whispered to His Mum). Nowadays, she works as a freelance illustrator. In addition to book and editorial illustration, Katarína is also involved in graphic design and contributes to children’s magazines such as Slniečko, Včielka, Zornička and SME deťom. She is a member of the Association of Illustrators (ASIL).
